BIOGRAPHY Andrei Gavrilov was born in Moscow
in 1955 in the artistic family. His father Vladimir Gavrilov was a great
painter, mother pupil of Henrich Neuhaus was his first teacher. He graduated
central music school in Moscow in 1973 where he studied with Tatiana Kestner.
Later this year he entered Moscow conservatory where his teacher was Lev
Naumov.
Andrei Gavrilov won first prize in the 1974 International Tchaikovsky
Competition at the age of 18 and in the same year made a triumphant
international debut at the Salzburg Festival, substituting for Sviatoslav
Richter. He has subsequently enjoyed a distinguished international career which
has included performances with many of the world's greatest orchestras.
He made his London debut in 1976 with Paavo Berglund and the Bournemouth
Symphony Orchestra in the Royal Festival Hall. In 1978 he performed with the
Berlin Philharmonic in a major European concert tour of 30 concerts. By 1980 he
had performed in all the major cultural centers in the world.
Andrei Gavrilov made a triumphant return to the British concert platform in
1984, after a politically enforced absence, giving recitals at the Barbican and
the Royal Festival Hall. He successfully petitioned Mikhail Gorbachev for his
freedom, and became the first Soviet artist to be granted permission to stay in
the West without having to file for political asylum.
Following his Carnegie Hall debut in 1985, Andrei Gavrilov was proclaimed
as a major artist by the New York Times' Donal Henahan. He has since performed
with orchestras in New York, Los Angeles, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago,
Philadelphia, Montreal, Toronto, London, Vienna, Paris, Berlin, Munich,
Amsterdam, Tokyo, Moscow, St-Petersburg and many other major orchestras with
conductors including Abbado, Haitink, Muti, Ozawa, Svetlanov,Tennstedt, Rattle
and Neville Mariner among numerous
others.
Between 1976 and 1990, Andrei Gavrilov was an exclusive artist with EMI,
winning several international prizes including a Gramophone award in 1979,
Deutscher Schallplattenpreis in 1981, Grand Prix International du Disque de
L'Academie Charles Crois in 1985 and 1986, and International Record Critics Award
(IRCA) in 1985. Among his other awards are the 1989 Premio Internazionale Accademia
Musicale Chigiana (the jury of music critics proclaiming him as the greatest
pianist in the world). In 1998 Andrei Gavrilov was selected as one of the
pianists to be featured in Philips Music Group's Great Pianists of the
Twentieth Century collection.
In October 1990 Andrei Gavrilov signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche
Gramophone, leading to acclaimed recordings of Chopin, Prokofiev, Schubert,
Bach and Grieg.
From 1994 until the year 2001 Andrei Gavrilov made a 7 years pause and almost
did not played open concerts. He studied philosophy and religion and was
searching for new ideas and his new approach to
music.
In 2001 he made his triumphant comeback to Russia after 16 years playing 4
piano concertos in one evening in the Moscow Conservatory. Since that time he
begins to play more and more regular around the world with greater success as
ever.
In 2008 he comes back for concert in
the United States.
In 2009 he made a world tour which
included four months long all Russian tour with enormous success.
In February 2010 he was invited to
the Vienna Philharmonic Golden Hall to play 4 concerts in a row after 14 years
long pause. The concerts were received with great critical acclaim.
Andrei Gavrilov is planning numerous
of CD and DVD recording first time after 1993 with works of Bach, Chopin,
Liszt, Schumann and others.
Forthcoming engagements include performances throughout the world including all
major countries.
